The Omega Theory

by Mark Alpert

  He turned in his chair so he could view another flat-panel screen. This one displayed a satellite image of the Ashkhaneh installation: a concrete entrance embedded at the foot of a mountain, leading to a network of tunnels and natural caverns that extended deep underground. Unfortunately, it was a hardened target. Readings from ground-penetrating radar had revealed that parts of the installation were more than a thousand feet below the surface. No conventional bunker-busting missile could reach that far. The only weapon that could destroy the facility in a single blow was the air force’s earth-penetrating nuclear warhead, which could collapse the whole underground network. That option was out of the question, of course—the president wasn’t going to start a nuclear war. But he wasn’t going to let Iran start one, either.

  Turning away from the screen, he sifted through the pile of loose-leaf binders. Most of the Defense Department’s plans called for conventional bunker-buster strikes on the Ashkhaneh facility, followed by the deployment of commando units to enter the damaged installation and destroy the nukes stored deep inside. The problem was that the Iranians had anticipated this strategy and taken steps to counter it. The facility was located in an inaccessible part of the country, far from the U.S. carriers in the Gulf and the bases in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Iranians also had a sophisticated air-defense system, with dozens of radar stations and missile batteries on their coast and most of their borders. Nearly all of the Pentagon’s battle plans predicted hundreds of casualties.

  But one plan was different. The president picked up the binder marked JSOC Operation Cobra. It was written by Lieutenant General Sam McNair, who commanded the Special Operations forces in Afghanistan. McNair had an impressive record of success, which was a rare thing indeed in the war against the Taliban. He also had a penchant for bold moves. His plan was the only one that offered the advantage of tactical surprise. If the plan worked as promised, the Special Operations assault group would attack from an unexpected direction, and the Iranians would have no time to move their nukes to a different facility. But the best part, in the president’s opinion, was the casualty estimate: fewer than thirty men killed or wounded.

  He glanced at his watch. It was time to return to the Oval Office. In twenty-nine minutes he was scheduled to give his televised address to the nation.

  He stood up and left the Situation Room. As he walked down the hallway, a Secret Service agent and a staff assistant fell into step behind him. He looked over his shoulder at the assistant.

  “Place a call to the defense secretary, please. Tell him to give the go-ahead to Cobra.”

  6

  THREE FIRE ENGINES, TWO HAZMAT TRUCKS, AND HALF A DOZEN POLICE cars were parked in front of the University of Maryland’s computer science building. David, Monique, and Agent Parker arrived at the scene at 2 A.M., more than six hours after the explosion, but the place was still teeming with emergency personnel. Lucille, who’d spent the past four hours driving the government-issue Chevrolet Suburban from New York to the Maryland campus, parked the SUV behind one of the police cars. From the backseat David gazed at the massive brick building. It looked undamaged—no broken windows, no blackened brick—but a crowd of state troopers, fire marshals, and plain-clothes detectives stood in front of the floodlit entrance, just outside a barricade of yellow crime-scene tape.

  Lucille turned to Monique, who sat in the SUV’s front passenger seat, and pointed at the building. “It doesn’t look so bad to me. Where’s Steele’s lab?”

  “I think it’s in the basement.” She looked over her shoulder at David. “Isn’t that right?”

  David had visited the Advanced Quantum Institute several years ago, before Jacob became its director, so he knew the layout. “Yeah, in the basement. That explains why the explosion didn’t damage the exterior.”

  Lucille nodded. “Okay, here’s how we’re gonna do this. You two are my scientific consultants. And that means you don’t talk unless I consult you. Got that?”

  She gave them a warning look. Although she’d agreed to bring them along, she clearly wasn’t happy about it. Normally, FBI agents didn’t invite civilians to a crime scene. But after hearing the news of Jacob Steele’s murder, Lucille had acknowledged that there might be a connection to Michael’s kidnapping. And the first step in investigating that connection, David and Monique had argued, was figuring out what Jacob had been working on. In the end, Lucille admitted that their expertise in quantum physics might prove useful. So when Karen Atwood arrived at the FBI office to pick up Jonah, Monique pleaded with her to take care of Baby Lisa, too. It was a big favor to ask, but Karen agreed. David’s first and second wives had forged a bond during their harrowing ordeal two years ago, and they’d gotten along well ever since.

  Now Lucille opened the SUV’s door, and David and Monique followed her outside. A tall, red-haired man in a gray suit stepped away from the crowd in front of the computer science building and came toward them. He reached into his jacket and pulled out his FBI badge.

  “Agent Parker?” he said. “I’m Dickinson from headquarters. I’ll be your liaison with the local field office.”

  Lucille shook Dickinson’s hand. “What’s the situation? Can we get into the building?”

  “The fire marshals gave the all clear about an hour ago. The explosion pulverized the lab, but there’s no major structural damage. Our crime-scene techs are in the basement right now.”

  “What have they found?” Lucille asked. “Have they done the residue tests yet?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Preliminary results indicate that the explosive was C-4. We’ve alerted the National Counterterrorism Center.”

  “Who have you interviewed so far?”

  Dickinson reached into his jacket again and pulled out a notebook. “Luckily, Steele’s lab was empty at the time of the explosion. There were some people still working elsewhere in the building, but none of them saw anything unusual before the blast.” He opened his notebook and leafed through the pages. “We contacted the university administration to get more information about Steele. And a few officials came down here to see the damage. One of them said he works with Steele.” He jerked his thumb at the computer science building. “His name’s Adam Bennett. He’s in the basement right now with one of my agents. I told Bennett to stick around because I thought you might want to talk to him. He doesn’t know yet that Steele is dead.”

  David knew Adam Bennett. He was a director at DARPA, the Pentagon agency that funded defense-related research. Bennett was in charge of awarding grants to scientists and engineers in nearly every field, from robotics and aerospace to communications and computer science. Personally, he was a likable guy; David had met him a year ago at an academic conference, and he’d seemed charming and intelligent. He’d just finished reading David’s biography of Albert Einstein and had many perceptive things to say about the book. Nevertheless, David had felt uncomfortable talking to him. Although DARPA was most famous for funding the invention of the Internet, the agency was also responsible for the Stealth bomber and the Predator drone. Bennett regularly visited Iraq and Afghanistan to field-test new technologies such as surveillance robots and laser-guided bullets. David, as a peace activist, found all this a little disturbing.

  “Bennett works for DARPA,” David told the FBI agents. “He’s director of the agency’s defense sciences office. He knows everyone in physics, and everyone knows him, because he’s the guy who doles out the cash.”

  “Yeah, he’s Jacob’s sugar daddy,” Monique added. “DARPA’s been funding research on quantum computing for at least a decade.”

  Agent Dickinson stared at them, obviously wondering who the hell they were. They looked nothing like law-enforcement officers—David still wore the khaki pants and tweed jacket he’d put on for the Physicists for Peace conference, and Monique was in her Bob Marley T-shirt. Dickinson turned to Lucille with a quizzical look on his face, but she ignored it. “Well, what the hell are we waiting for?” she said. “Let’s say hello to the guy.”

  Sh
e marched toward the computer science building, clearing a path through the crowd of police officers and ducking under the crime-scene tape. David and Monique followed her through the entrance, with Dickinson close behind.

  In the lobby they made a quick right and headed down a stairway that smelled of burned plastic. But they saw no tangible evidence of the explosion until they left the stairwell and walked a hundred feet down the basement corridor. Above a gray steel door was a sign that said ADVANCED QUANTUM INSTITUTE: HOME OF THE TRAPPED IONS. Lucille pushed the door open and they stepped into the ruined laboratory.

  The room was cavernous and dark, illuminated only by the emergency lights brought in by the fire department and the roving flashlight beams of the FBI crime-scene investigators. The air was warm and acrid and the cinderblock walls were caked with soot. A layer of wet ash carpeted the floor, and thick clods of it stuck to David’s shoes. The building’s sprinklers had apparently quenched the blaze, but not before it had blackened the lab benches and gutted the storage cabinets and melted every computer and monitor. Chunks of twisted metal were everywhere, thrown across the room by the force of the blast. David looked up and saw that the explosion had pitted the plaster ceiling and smashed the overhead pipes and wiring. Severed fiber-optic cables hung from the ceiling like dead snakes, their glassy fibers bursting through the charred insulation.

  Agent Dickinson led them across the room, walking past the jagged hole in the floor that had obviously been the epicenter of the blast. They headed down another corridor, following the string of emergency lights, and as they moved away from the lab the acrid stench lessened. Then they turned a corner and entered an office that the FBI had converted to a temporary command post. The agents had set up their equipment on the office desk: a radio, a couple of laptops, and a portable spectrometer for analyzing explosives residue. An agent with a blond crew cut was fiddling with the radio, while an older man in a black herringbone suit sat in the office chair. David recognized him immediately. It was Adam Bennett.

  The blond agent snapped to attention when Lucille walked into the room. Bennett also rose to his feet, glancing first at Agent Parker and then at David and Monique. His eyes widened. “Dr. Swift? And Dr. Reynolds? What are you doing here?”

  Bennett was in his mid-sixties. He had thinning white hair and a serious, square-jawed face, with gray eyes and a pinkish complexion, the kind that sunburned easily. He seemed agitated, which was understandable. Several million dollars’ worth of DARPA-financed laboratory equipment had just been blown to bits.

  Lucille marched right up to him and held out her hand. “Mr. Bennett, I’m Special Agent Lucille Parker of the—”

  “What took you so long?” he demanded, ignoring her proffered hand. “I’ve been waiting in this office for two hours.”

  She said nothing in response but cocked her head ever so slightly. The agent with the crew cut got the message and left the office with Dickinson.

  Bennett scowled at her. David thought it was odd to see them standing face-to-face, because they looked so similar. Bennett was about the same age as Lucille and just as stocky. Even his hair was the same color as Lucille’s, although she had considerably more of it. “Where’s Jacob Steele?” he asked. “Is he still in New York?”

  “Sit down, Mr. Bennett.”

  He remained standing. His face turned a little pinker. “You’re not the only federal official here. This is a DARPA project and I have every right to know what’s going on!”

  Lucille frowned. Her brow furrowed and dozens of creases fanned from the corners of her eyes. “All right. I’ll tell you what’s going on. Jacob Steele came to New York this afternoon to see these two.” She pointed at David and Monique. “He wanted to talk about a scientific instrument he was working on, something called the Caduceus Array. That name ring a bell?”

  “No, I never heard of it.”

  “I’m not surprised. No one’s heard of the damn thing. And unfortunately, Jacob didn’t get a chance to describe it either. While he was visiting Columbia University’s physics building this evening, someone with a nine-millimeter pistol put a bullet in his head.”

  Bennett stood there silently for a moment, staring at Lucille, as if waiting for her to say something else. Then he let out a sigh and stepped backward. He sank into the office chair from which he’d risen just a minute ago.

  “At approximately the same time, someone blew up Jacob’s lab,” Lucille continued. “We’re obviously dealing with a sophisticated organization, with multiple teams of operatives carrying out synchronized missions. Most likely a terrorist organization. Now you see why we’re taking this so seriously?”

  Bennett closed his eyes and raised a hand to his forehead. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he muttered something under his breath.

  Lucille stepped closer. “To pursue this investigation, I need to know exactly what Jacob was working on. That’s why I’m here. And that’s why you need to stop bitching and start telling me about Jacob’s research.” She leaned over his chair. “You think you can do that?”

  Several seconds passed. Bennett shrank from Lucille’s implacable gaze. Then he opened his eyes and gripped the armrests of his chair. Slowly and unsteadily, he stood up. All the bluster had drained out of him. “Excuse me. I need to go to the men’s room.”

  Lucille pointed at him. “Go ahead. Just don’t take too long.” She went to the office door and threw it open for Bennett. As he passed through the doorway, she gave another signal to the two agents who were waiting in the hall. Both of them followed Bennett down the corridor. Then she slammed the door shut.

  David was surprised. “Why’d you let him go?”

  “He’ll talk once he gets back.” She went to the chair that Bennett had vacated and sat down with a grunt. “He’s worried about something. Why else would he come down here in the middle of the night? It’s something embarrassing, and because the guy’s a mucky-muck in the federal bureaucracy, he knows he has to tell us about it before we find out from someone else. But he’s also a chickenshit, see? So he has to go to the bathroom and look in the mirror for a few minutes and work up his courage. It’s standard chickenshit behavior. I’ve seen it a million times.”

  Shaking her head, she reached into her bright red jacket and pulled out a pair of latex gloves from the inside pocket. Then she rolled her chair closer to the desk and started inspecting the contents of its drawers. She rummaged through a file cabinet and a drawer containing circuit boards and miscellaneous bits of hardware. David watched her, fascinated. She gave everything a quick look, her eyes keen and darting.

  After a while she opened another drawer and pulled out a shiny metal canister about the size of a soup can. It had wires coming out of the bottom and a circular pane of glass at the top. Through the glass top David could see two parallel rows of electrodes inside the device. A dark groove ran between the rows, about three inches long and a quarter of an inch wide. Lucille grabbed the reading glasses that hung from her beaded necklace and peered into the device. “Okay, here’s your first chance to do some consulting. What the hell is this thing?”

  Monique went to the desk and looked over Lucille’s shoulder. It took her less than three seconds to identify the object. “That’s an ion trap. It’s the heart of the quantum computers that Jacob was building. Remember what I said in the car? About what makes quantum computers different from ordinary PCs?”

  During the long drive from New York to Maryland, Monique had started to explain the basics of quantum computing. Luckily, Agent Parker was a quick study. “Yeah, I remember,” she said. “Quantum computers use atoms to do the calculating. Unlike ordinary computers, which use electrical currents. But what’s with the ions?”

  “An ion is an atom with an electrical charge. If you add an extra electron to an atom, you make a negatively charged ion. If you strip away an electron, you make it positively charged. The advantage of using ions is that you can move them around easily. You can put positive ions in a vacuum chamber and keep them
suspended between positively charged electrodes.” Monique took the container out of Lucille’s hands and pointed at the dark groove inside. “The positive ion goes here, into the gap between the positive electrodes. Positive repels positive, right? So the repulsion on both sides traps the ion, keeps it in a stationary position. Then you can trap more ions in the gap and arrange them in a line, perfectly spaced. Like a row of beads in an abacus.”

  “Why would you want to do that?”

  “Each ion has a magnetic orientation that can point up or down, like a switch. So it’s similar to a bit in an ordinary computer. You know what a bit is, right? As in megabit, gigabit?”

  Lucille nodded. “Of course. That’s how much data you can put in your computer.”

  Monique smiled. She loved to explain these kinds of things. “That’s right. A bit is a single unit of data, and it has two possible values, zero or one. Putting eight bits together makes a byte, and each byte represents one of the characters on a computer’s keyboard.” She pointed at one of the laptops sitting on the desk in front of Lucille. “This computer has a microprocessor with four gigabytes of RAM, so it can perform calculations on four billion bytes of data. That’s more than enough memory to run a spreadsheet program or display a YouTube video. But a quantum computer could do much more.”

  “How so?”

  “Remember how I said that each ion can point up or down? Well, imagine that the up orientation is zero, and down is one. If you look at it that way, each ion contains one bit of information, because it can be either one or zero. A string of eight ions, some up and some down, contains a byte of information. And we can change the information contained in the string by firing a laser beam at the ions, which flips their orientation. But here’s the best part.” Monique paused to take a breath. “When you’re dealing with individual ions, all the crazy rules of quantum theory apply. Particles are waves and waves are particles, and nothing is completely precise or predictable. And one of the crazy consequences of quantum theory is that we can put an ion into something called a superposition state. In this state, the ion is pointing up and down at the same time.”